This summer marked the fourth Capital Fringe Festival. I e-mailed three area playwrights who had plays in the festival and asked them to briefly share their experiences.
Renee Calarco: Was this your first time as a Fringe artist?
Susan Austin Roth (MISSING PAGES): Yes.
Anthony Gallo (LINCOLN AND GOD): This was my third fringe experience.
Martin Blank (DRIVING GREEN): I had a short play two years ago.
RC: What were your goals?
SAR: To put this play before an audience and to get a review to help market the play. The audience was engaged and loved the play, and the play got a great review.
AG: To showcase the play.
MB: My goals are always the same. I have to be paid for my work. I have to have a contract. I want to make a play as good as I can. I was paid. I had a contract. I was able to do rewrites.
RC: What was your biggest challenge?
SAR: The A/C was insufficient and temperatures were over 90° F on stage. We could not see our venue until our tech, which was the afternoon of our first performance.
AG: Hiring a cast.
MB: The script was frozen by tech for the actors’ sake, so no more chances to rewrite during the run.
RC: What was your biggest pleasant surprise?
SAR: The audience came up to me afterward to tell me how moved they were by the play and that it deserved a mainstage production.
AG: Good reviews.
MB: How well the shows sold in an environment where there are 120 choices!
RC: What’s one piece of advice you wish you’d heard before producing at Fringe?
SAR: Don’t do this unless you take the “find your own venue” option…(it) gives you a lot more scheduling freedom and assures you of getting the type of venue and access that you need.
AG: Marketing, marketing, marketing.
MB: I didn’t produce my play this year or two years ago in Fringe. As a playwright I tried to keep things really simple…and I think that got my plays done, and gave them a better chance at being done well.
RC: How much time did you spend doing this?
SAR: Pretty much full-time for three months.
AG: Oodles and oodles of time.
MB: About ten hours during rehearsal, and ten hours seeing the shows.
Information about the 2010 Capital Fringe Festival is at www.capfringe.org
Washington, D.C.
This summer marked the fourth Capital Fringe Festival. I e-mailed three area playwrights who had plays in the festival and asked them to briefly share their experiences.
Renee Calarco: Was this your first time as a Fringe artist?
Susan Austin Roth (MISSING PAGES): Yes.
Anthony Gallo (LINCOLN AND GOD): This was my third fringe experience.
Martin Blank (DRIVING GREEN): I had a short play two years ago.
RC: What were your goals?
SAR: To put this play before an audience and to get a review to help market the play. The audience was engaged and loved the play, and the play got a great review.
AG: To showcase the play.
MB: My goals are always the same. I have to be paid for my work. I have to have a contract. I want to make a play as good as I can. I was paid. I had a contract. I was able to do rewrites.
RC: What was your biggest challenge?
SAR: The A/C was insufficient and temperatures were over 90° F on stage. We could not see our venue until our tech, which was the afternoon of our first performance.
AG: Hiring a cast.
MB: The script was frozen by tech for the actors’ sake, so no more chances to rewrite during the run.
RC: What was your biggest pleasant surprise?
SAR: The audience came up to me afterward to tell me how moved they were by the play and that it deserved a mainstage production.
AG: Good reviews.
MB: How well the shows sold in an environment where there are 120 choices!
RC: What’s one piece of advice you wish you’d heard before producing at Fringe?
SAR: Don’t do this unless you take the “find your own venue” option…(it) gives you a lot more scheduling freedom and assures you of getting the type of venue and access that you need.
AG: Marketing, marketing, marketing.
MB: I didn’t produce my play this year or two years ago in Fringe. As a playwright I tried to keep things really simple…and I think that got my plays done, and gave them a better chance at being done well.
RC: How much time did you spend doing this?
SAR: Pretty much full-time for three months.
AG: Oodles and oodles of time.
MB: About ten hours during rehearsal, and ten hours seeing the shows.
Information about the 2010 Capital Fringe Festival is at www.capfringe.org
rcalarco@dramatistsguild.com